Members of the PCS union who work in Midlands offices of the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) and Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs (HMRC) are on strike again on Wednesday June 5th.

PCS members in the DWP are angry because:* 20,000 jobs have been cut in the DWP since May 2010* Years of pay restraint has seen our living standards drop by 20%* We are all be affected by planned cuts in our terms and conditions* Targets, attendance management andpeople performance mean more stress* Their pensions have been attacked.* The government say they won’t talk about these issues

In HMRC Government plans to close every HMRC public enquiry office with the loss of 1200 jobs and an essential service to the public.

Support PCS by attending picket lines from 7.30 am and the public rally at lunchtime:-

Birmingham Benefits Justice Campaign are holding a demonstration on Sat 15th June from 12noon in Chamberlain Square. This will remember Stephanie Bottrill from Solihull who committed suicide, blaming the government and the bedroom tax in the notes she left. This is being held with permission of the family.

More than 25,000 people applied for the ‘discretionary housing payment’ to help pay their rent this month, as the Bedroom Tax kicked in. This compares to just 5,700 applications in the same month last year. Notices of eviction are being issued up and down the country. Caught up in these figures were a blind widow, a disabled dad and a rape victim. It is time to put a human face on the statistical failure of the Bedroom Tax.

The Blind Widow

Helen Sockell, 56, (pictured above) has lived in her Kilmarnock home for 25 years. Her husband John died in 2005 and their son Andrew died, aged just 24 in the same year. She is blind and now lives alone, supported by a full time carer.

She has no way to find the additional £33 a fortnight that the Bedroom Tax has added to her costs and so…

Motherland, I have been meaning to write you, For some time now, But my words simply cannot cascade, Across my page like the rivers, Falling across your mountains, My words cannot descend from this pen, Like the tears your women still cry, How do I embody their strength – in this? How do I paint the remnants of children, Across maps of our valleys, In search of a heart that might just be beating, Somewhere.

I have been meaning to tell you, I have fallen so in love since I left you, I dream of your valleys, I cradle them within me, unwilling to let go. But the memories of my love, Are encrypted in the painful remembrance, Of rape and massacres, Of mass graves and torture, Of the tears cried by Parveena Ahangar, As she searches for the strength to continue, Now how do I write this to…